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Police worry over gun crime

TONY EASTLEY: Sydney has a growing reputation for gun crime that is worrying police as well as the public.

A spike in shootings has highlighted the problem of illegal weapons and more importantly the attitude that some people have to using them, often to settle petty disputes over money and property.

Three men have been shot since the weekend and eight have died in shootings in the last five months.

The acting police commissioner in New South Wales, Nick Kaldas, is speaking here to AM's Simon Santow.

SIMON SANTOW: Nick Kaldas, the long-term trend is for gun crime to be going down but it seems that in recent times it hasn't been the case.

NICK KALDAS: You certainly get spikes on a short-term basis but the bottom line is it is definitely trending downwards in the longer term.

But we also accept that that is not something of great comfort to the community. One shooting incident is too many. One shooting up of a house is too many. And we're not taking our eye off the ball. We're obviously watching as closely as we can and working very hard at catching those responsible and dealing with it.

SIMON SANTOW: So three men shot just since Sunday, two of whom have died. What do you put that down to?

NICK KALDAS: There really isn't one single factor or explanation for these incidents. They are very diverse.

But by and large, they are incidents where low level conflicts occur between different people and instead of perhaps punching each other as they may have in years gone by, it seems to be more acceptable now for people to get a weapon and go out and shoot them instead of having a physical altercation.

SIMON SANTOW: Is it easier access to weapons?

NICK KALDAS: I don't know that it's easier access but certainly access to weapons, you've hit on a very important point. I mean if the weapons are not available, if they're not handy, if they're not accessible, then you wouldn't be having this. So that's- we're very focused on that and certainly working on trying to identify where these weapons are coming from so we can try and head that off.

But certainly if somebody has a gripe or a conflict with someone and they don't have access to a weapon the worst you could hope for would be a punch-up, whereas if they have access to a weapon then obviously it may translate into something far more serious.

SIMON SANTOW: It's just that over the last year or two Sydney-siders have gotten used to drive-by shootings and often the police reassure the public by saying 'Look, it's just people having an argument over drugs, they're not endangering the public'. That would seem different though this time.

NICK KALDAS: I wouldn't say they're not endangering the public. I think that there is, you know, there's always a chance obviously that an innocent bystander or people get the wrong house and shoot it up and somebody that has nothing to do with their conflict gets hurt.

But I do agree that by and large these are targeted, specific attacks. They're not random. They don't pick on, you know, Mr and Mrs Citizen. It's usually someone they know well and they've had some sort of criminal conflict with.

Strike Force Raptor for instance over the last year or so have arrested nearly 2,000 people and laid 4,500 charges.

SIMON SANTOW: But the mere fact, acting commissioner, that you are throwing so many resources and arresting so many people, wouldn't that indicate that the size of the problem is even bigger?

NICK KALDAS: Well I don't know that it's even bigger. Certainly we have a fairly good idea of the size of the problem we're facing and that's why we're dedicating the resources that we need to to try and hit it on the head.

SIMON SANTOW: Is this problem unique to Sydney, within Australia?

NICK KALDAS: I suspect it's present in most capital cities, not only in Australia but probably the Western world. But it fluctuates and there will always be trends going up or down. What we must do is to keep our eye on those trends.

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